Adelyn from ONE63 European Bistro and Bar invited me to preview their New Year's Eve Menu. The 7 course dinner comes with free flow of Italian house wines and bubblies costs RM388++ per person.
This special menu is the creation of Executive Chef Kelvin Lee. Kelvin is a passionate chef with the vision to share European fine dining with Johoreans. Read more about Kevin in my post about my earlier visit to ONE63 European Bistro.
French dinners are whole night long affairs, taking time to appreciate the food and enjoy the company with free flowing wine and good music.
Kelvin has created a menu of French and Italian specialities with a creative local twist at the end :D Each course was a delight and left me eagerly anticipating the next. At the end, my stomach was full but left me craving and hungry to come back again to enjoy Kelvin's artistry.
Follow me in reliving my fine dining experience at ONE63. Warning: Bear with me, this post will be long and self indulgent as a good European dinner on New Year's eve should be :D
While waiting for the first course, we nibbled at this old school buttery Yorkshire pudding. Humble, basic and yet, it's the first signal that tonight's dinner will be an experience to remember.
We started with this large and succulent fresh American oyster with escargot caviar and sun dried tomatoes. It sounds cliché but it really did felt like I could "taste the sea". I love the flavour and the creamy tender mouth feel of top grade oysters. The escargot caviar and dried tomatoes made it even more interesting.
Second course, duck egg bon-bon. The poached duck egg is enjoyed with duck consommé (broth). Lovely duck egg flavour. The execution of this seemingly simple dish and the beautiful plating left me in awe of Kevin's obsessive artistry.
Third course. Kevin's risotto is the best that I have ever tasted.
Hey, don't take my word for it. Kevin's risotto was voted the best risotto in Southeast Asia by HungryGoWhere readers in 2010.
The thick sauce was robustly savoury and the rice grains had a nice nutty bite. I want to come back to ONE63 for this, definitely.
The risotto was served with a deep sea Spanish Carbinaros prawn. The Spanish Carbinaros prawn with capsicum caviar was creamy, savoury and refreshing in the mouth. Just one, so I took my time to savour it :D
What is this strange but crunchy looking red alien? Not an alien, but the taste was indeed, out of this world. It's the Carbinaros prawn's head. Can you see it's brain?
Course four, grilled ox tongue with asparagus, tomato fondue and truffle jus.
The thin slice of grilled ox tongue was wrapped around a stalk of boiled American asparagus. The tongue was soft but chewy. I like the slight beefy flavour and the tongue's leathery yet tender texture.
Fifth course was a large chunk of roasted cod fish with green pea puree and vegetable à la grecque. It looks beautifully black because it was coated with charcoal butter.
The thick chunk of snowy cod was tender and juicy with a refreshing natural sweetness. The outer butter charcoal layer gives it a subtle savouriness.
Sixth course, the roasted lamb loin served with wine leaves, filo pastry, caramelised beetroot, eggplant caviar and natural jus.
Done medium rare, the lamb was juicy and tender with a mild lamb flavour which I like.
The eggplant caviar was a blend of egg plant pulp and caviar.
The final course, pineapple ravioli dessert. It's an original Kevin Lee creation which is a fusion of Southeast Asian and European.
The ravioli is a "pineapple tart filling" in the middle, wrapped with two thin slices of pineapple. The ravioli were topped with pineapple sauce and Campari Espuma.
With this beautiful and unique dessert, the dinner ended on a sweet and refreshing note.
Personally, this scrumptious dinner made me very happy. Happy because since I started to blog about Johor food two years ago, I found the Johor food scene more interesting each year. With this dinner at ONE63, I am confidently optimistic that there will be more great things to come in the Johor food scene in 2014.
We can have our New Year's eve dinner at the Liquid Room at the ground level.
At the Dining Room upstairs.
Or, the private room which seats 10 people comfortably.
One63 European Bistro and Bar is located at the northern end of historic Jalan Trus. It is steps away from Tropical Inn hotel.
Customers can park their cars at the nearby Tropical Inn. After 8:00pm, parking is free at Tropical Inn :D
Johor Kaki takes this opportunity to wish readers, Happy New Year and a great year ahead in 2014.
Restaurant name: ONE63 European Bistro & Bar
Address: 163, Jalan Ngee Heng, Johor Bahru (beside Tropical Inn)
Map: http://goo.gl/maps/lg22W
GPS: 1.465643,103.760075
Hours: 11:00am to 12:00 midnight daily
No pork, no lard, alcohol served
Date visited: 28 Jun 2013, 28 Dec 2013
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